Evoke 2026 | August 21 – 23 | Cologne, Germany
category: parties [glöplog]
Can't stop, won't stop: Celebrate with us for the 27th time!
As is our custom, the website is coming soon, but if you know us you know what to expect – same venue, same great vibes, and a sprinkle of constant change (for good, that is). Our organizers have survived the yearly defrosting and are already working on this year's edition, so expect updates soon! For now, our call to action for you is to book your accomodations and travel and start dreaming up your entries – time is flying by faster than you'd expect it to. ;)
Whether it's your first time with us, or the 27th, we're looking forward to seeing your joyful faces in the Abenteuerhallen. Cheers!
As is our custom, the website is coming soon, but if you know us you know what to expect – same venue, same great vibes, and a sprinkle of constant change (for good, that is). Our organizers have survived the yearly defrosting and are already working on this year's edition, so expect updates soon! For now, our call to action for you is to book your accomodations and travel and start dreaming up your entries – time is flying by faster than you'd expect it to. ;)
Whether it's your first time with us, or the 27th, we're looking forward to seeing your joyful faces in the Abenteuerhallen. Cheers!
Code:
Buchungsbestätigung Phi-1337-5711 from PhiLeRo Hotel Köln.
Evoke is 20-7, Evoke is 20-7, Evoke is 20-20-20-7!
We will rock that place and drink Koelsch in the process!
We will koelsch that place and drink rock in the process!
Our process is to drink Koelsch on the rocks. NOT.
COMPO ANNOUNCEMENT
Evoke Drone Compo
Evoke 2025 featured a drone show and we are currently trying to make the next step: A Drone Compo.
For those of you who missed it:
Here is the video of last years show: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u_EHFf49mNA
During the compo the drones will take off and we will show all the entries while the drones are in the sky. To make that possible this will require quite some preparation from our side as we have to introduce transitions between entries etc. So this compo will work a bit differently:
You have to send us your entries beforehand so we can integrate them. Deadline for this will be roughly 1 month before the party (details will follow). This means that this compo is open for remote submissions. However trophies will only be handed out to people actually present at the party. Also if you have been at Evoke 2025 you will know that the video does not at all capture the real experience on site and you will want to see your production live on screen...ehhhh... in the sky.
Just as last year we will have 100 drones.
Even though we are still working on the permissions we want to reach out to you to spark some interest in this compo, provide some details on how to create an entry and get you actually working :).
Please note that this compo is highly risky in multiple regards and might not happen due to a magnitude of things:
- we fail to get all the permissions
- the weather is too bad on both days (a bit of rain is ok but storm would kill the compo right away)
- on the day of the show the local airport might just say "no" and decline take off
- fixed time slot: unlike other compos we can't really stretch the compo time and will have to preselect in case we get too many entries
- 2025 we lost a drone after a short time. we are pretty certain this was a rare incident. but you never know. maybe your prod will be shown with 10 drones less than planned because we lost a few during the compo and we show your entry last
- something else we are not yet aware of (we are still learning)
That being said this might also be a "once in a lifetime" opportunity. Even though we are getting the drones for the second time in a row by our sponsor LANG AG this is by no means to be taken granted for the next years. On the other hand if it fails this year it might as well happen next year. We have no idea :).
Status Quo Permissions
The process of getting all the permissions is a classic waterfall process so they all depend on the previously listed step.
- Neighbours are ok with it :white_check_mark:
- Flight permit by the German Airspace Authority :x:
- Permit by the Office for Public Order :x:
- Area permit by the city (they are the owners of our flight zone) :x:
We are already in contact with the people from the city and have gotten positive vibes but for the next steps we need the flight permit and - probably - due to all the drone incidents at airports in recent times they seem to be a lot more rigid (last year this was the simplest of all the bullet points). Right now there is is legislative process in the works which is supposed to be finished by July and a permit can only be handed out by then. However there is already a directive by them that drone flights are generally to be permitted in so called airport control zones and in the conversations with them it seems more of an how (i.e. how high can the drones actually fly and can we run one full show with 15 minutes or do we need to take off twice for a shorter time) and not an if anymore. So positive vibes as well but no actual permit yet.
How to create an entry
Your entry will have to be compatible with Blender 4.1.1
To create an entry fire up Blender, create a mesh, the vertices of the mesh will represent the drones.
In Edit mode, check Mesh Edit mode overlays and enable edge length in order to check the distance between the vertices. The LoopTool addon is your friend. Once you're happy with your design, you'll have to work on the color attributes of the vertices.
You can use Geometry nodes in order to instanciate small spheres on the mesh's points.
In order to give colors to the drones we will use the vertex color attribute.
We hope we can provide a video in the coming days to explain the process.
If you're animating your drone formation, keep in mind that drones have quite some constraints:
- max. horizontal Speed: 7m/s
- max. Up speed: 4,5m/s
- max. Down Speed: 3,5m/s
- max. Horizontal acceleration: 6m/s
- max. Up/ down acceleration: 4m/s
- minimum Distance: 1.6m
- FPS for color change: 10fps
So you can't just freely move the dots around. Unfortunately there are - to our understanding so far - no openly available plugins to check these constraints or even help when planning animations and we are currently figuring out a good process for you to create an entry. That means that any position animation is not trivially possible. However if you ever wanted to see your group logo in the sky with animated colors: That is quite easily doable and absolutely something for this compo and you can easily check the distance between drones by enabling the standard edge length visualization within blender. Some - slowly - rotating static formation would also be possible right away.
Ultimately all entries will be merged into one big blender file by us and then exported using a proprietary addon in blender.
As we will create transitions you can just start off right away with your drone formation. You don't have to worry about take off, landing etc. We will ensure that the formation your planned in the first frame is somehow reached and from there your entry will be shown.
You can also provide a soundtrack as mp3 that will be played while your entry will be shown. Note that for now this will be manually synced. That means somebody will press a button and it will likely not be 100% in sync.
We will investigate if we can make actual music sync happen.
We don't yet have an idea about maximum running time for entries but for static formations it is likely not 5 minutes :)
Next steps
We really hoped to have more details and the actual permit by now but everything proved to be a lot more difficult. Sorry for that. We are actively working on the permissions problem and hope to resolve it soon but it seems we have to wait for July.
As this is an entirely new compo we need to create some rules and we hope that you can help us with it. If you want to participate, have questions or have ideas regarding the compo please contact drone-compo@evoke.eu so we can up with something soon.
We will provide a base blender file containing the flight zone and the general setup shortly. We also hope we can provide you some plugin that helps to create an entry that is fully animated.
To get some inspiration and have a look at what a final show might look like have a look at last years blend file: https://nbg1.your-objectstorage.com/public-akronyme-analogiker/EvokeShow2025_Colors_Final_.zip
More details will follow shortly. Now get to work, start prototyping and make sure to contact us :)
Evoke Drone Compo
Evoke 2025 featured a drone show and we are currently trying to make the next step: A Drone Compo.
For those of you who missed it:
Here is the video of last years show: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u_EHFf49mNA
During the compo the drones will take off and we will show all the entries while the drones are in the sky. To make that possible this will require quite some preparation from our side as we have to introduce transitions between entries etc. So this compo will work a bit differently:
You have to send us your entries beforehand so we can integrate them. Deadline for this will be roughly 1 month before the party (details will follow). This means that this compo is open for remote submissions. However trophies will only be handed out to people actually present at the party. Also if you have been at Evoke 2025 you will know that the video does not at all capture the real experience on site and you will want to see your production live on screen...ehhhh... in the sky.
Just as last year we will have 100 drones.
Even though we are still working on the permissions we want to reach out to you to spark some interest in this compo, provide some details on how to create an entry and get you actually working :).
Please note that this compo is highly risky in multiple regards and might not happen due to a magnitude of things:
- we fail to get all the permissions
- the weather is too bad on both days (a bit of rain is ok but storm would kill the compo right away)
- on the day of the show the local airport might just say "no" and decline take off
- fixed time slot: unlike other compos we can't really stretch the compo time and will have to preselect in case we get too many entries
- 2025 we lost a drone after a short time. we are pretty certain this was a rare incident. but you never know. maybe your prod will be shown with 10 drones less than planned because we lost a few during the compo and we show your entry last
- something else we are not yet aware of (we are still learning)
That being said this might also be a "once in a lifetime" opportunity. Even though we are getting the drones for the second time in a row by our sponsor LANG AG this is by no means to be taken granted for the next years. On the other hand if it fails this year it might as well happen next year. We have no idea :).
Status Quo Permissions
The process of getting all the permissions is a classic waterfall process so they all depend on the previously listed step.
- Neighbours are ok with it :white_check_mark:
- Flight permit by the German Airspace Authority :x:
- Permit by the Office for Public Order :x:
- Area permit by the city (they are the owners of our flight zone) :x:
We are already in contact with the people from the city and have gotten positive vibes but for the next steps we need the flight permit and - probably - due to all the drone incidents at airports in recent times they seem to be a lot more rigid (last year this was the simplest of all the bullet points). Right now there is is legislative process in the works which is supposed to be finished by July and a permit can only be handed out by then. However there is already a directive by them that drone flights are generally to be permitted in so called airport control zones and in the conversations with them it seems more of an how (i.e. how high can the drones actually fly and can we run one full show with 15 minutes or do we need to take off twice for a shorter time) and not an if anymore. So positive vibes as well but no actual permit yet.
How to create an entry
Your entry will have to be compatible with Blender 4.1.1
To create an entry fire up Blender, create a mesh, the vertices of the mesh will represent the drones.
In Edit mode, check Mesh Edit mode overlays and enable edge length in order to check the distance between the vertices. The LoopTool addon is your friend. Once you're happy with your design, you'll have to work on the color attributes of the vertices.
You can use Geometry nodes in order to instanciate small spheres on the mesh's points.
In order to give colors to the drones we will use the vertex color attribute.
We hope we can provide a video in the coming days to explain the process.
If you're animating your drone formation, keep in mind that drones have quite some constraints:
- max. horizontal Speed: 7m/s
- max. Up speed: 4,5m/s
- max. Down Speed: 3,5m/s
- max. Horizontal acceleration: 6m/s
- max. Up/ down acceleration: 4m/s
- minimum Distance: 1.6m
- FPS for color change: 10fps
So you can't just freely move the dots around. Unfortunately there are - to our understanding so far - no openly available plugins to check these constraints or even help when planning animations and we are currently figuring out a good process for you to create an entry. That means that any position animation is not trivially possible. However if you ever wanted to see your group logo in the sky with animated colors: That is quite easily doable and absolutely something for this compo and you can easily check the distance between drones by enabling the standard edge length visualization within blender. Some - slowly - rotating static formation would also be possible right away.
Ultimately all entries will be merged into one big blender file by us and then exported using a proprietary addon in blender.
As we will create transitions you can just start off right away with your drone formation. You don't have to worry about take off, landing etc. We will ensure that the formation your planned in the first frame is somehow reached and from there your entry will be shown.
You can also provide a soundtrack as mp3 that will be played while your entry will be shown. Note that for now this will be manually synced. That means somebody will press a button and it will likely not be 100% in sync.
We will investigate if we can make actual music sync happen.
We don't yet have an idea about maximum running time for entries but for static formations it is likely not 5 minutes :)
Next steps
We really hoped to have more details and the actual permit by now but everything proved to be a lot more difficult. Sorry for that. We are actively working on the permissions problem and hope to resolve it soon but it seems we have to wait for July.
As this is an entirely new compo we need to create some rules and we hope that you can help us with it. If you want to participate, have questions or have ideas regarding the compo please contact drone-compo@evoke.eu so we can up with something soon.
We will provide a base blender file containing the flight zone and the general setup shortly. We also hope we can provide you some plugin that helps to create an entry that is fully animated.
To get some inspiration and have a look at what a final show might look like have a look at last years blend file: https://nbg1.your-objectstorage.com/public-akronyme-analogiker/EvokeShow2025_Colors_Final_.zip
More details will follow shortly. Now get to work, start prototyping and make sure to contact us :)
Wow. This is a really cool compo-idea!
This sounds amazingly amazing!
Love the idea and the effort to make it happen. I wish you much success.
By the way, do you have any idea what will be the dimensions of the box for the show?
lsd?
First update: Newemka has made a short tutorial to give you an idea how to start:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uZHE-FKY1yM
and here is the resulting blend file:
https://nbg1.your-objectstorage.com/public-akronyme-analogiker/DroneFormationExample_Evoke27th.blend
yes - mostly :D if you download last years blend file (URL is at the end of the original post and some idiot failed to make it an actual link) you will find a "FlyZone" mesh. If you click to show it in the viewport you will see it and the current zone will likely look the same.
we are currently discussing if we should limit the height to 80m. Lang told us they had a case where they had to go down to 80m ON THE DAY OF THE SHOW because airport control told them this would be the limit of the day 😂 which meant they had to improvise and redo parts of the show. we could risk it to use the 100m and if the same should happen we would have to improvise as well or we impose a 80m right away. If you want to play safe: limit yourself to 80m. last year we didn't have any problems and the highest point a drone was going was roughly 90m.
A base blend file (including the official flight zone for this year) will be posted shortly once we finished this discussion.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uZHE-FKY1yM
and here is the resulting blend file:
https://nbg1.your-objectstorage.com/public-akronyme-analogiker/DroneFormationExample_Evoke27th.blend
Quote:
By the way, do you have any idea what will be the dimensions of the box for the show?
yes - mostly :D if you download last years blend file (URL is at the end of the original post and some idiot failed to make it an actual link) you will find a "FlyZone" mesh. If you click to show it in the viewport you will see it and the current zone will likely look the same.
we are currently discussing if we should limit the height to 80m. Lang told us they had a case where they had to go down to 80m ON THE DAY OF THE SHOW because airport control told them this would be the limit of the day 😂 which meant they had to improvise and redo parts of the show. we could risk it to use the 100m and if the same should happen we would have to improvise as well or we impose a 80m right away. If you want to play safe: limit yourself to 80m. last year we didn't have any problems and the highest point a drone was going was roughly 90m.
A base blend file (including the official flight zone for this year) will be posted shortly once we finished this discussion.